Lenoir County Board of Election Meeting

Lenoir County Board of Election Meeting

Tuesday February 18, 2014

Present at the meeting: Election Director: Dana King, Board Chair: Lucinda Minges, Member: Tommy Pharo, Member: Courtney Patterson and Citizens Guest: John Nix, Michelle Nix, Mr. and Mrs. Hampton.

The Lenoir County Board of Election met on Tuesday February 18, 2014 in the board room at the Board of Election’s Office. This was a called meeting to discuss a recommendation by the Elections Director to reduce the number of hours during early voting for the 2014 May primary.

Lucinda Minges, Board Chair, explained the reason for the meeting was to discuss the one stop voting and the difference in the days and the hours if there is going to be any. She had asked Dana to pull up what we did last time, such as the laws and what’s fair that would not cost us an arm and a leg. She noted that the one point we need to keep in mind is we have seven less days and in order to have the same hours we would need to work 13 and ½ hours a day. She stated we can open days that we hadn’t planned to be open but in order to work 13 and ½ hours we would need 32 people instead of 16 people. She stated that we are just dealing with the seven less days.

Dana King the Election Director, explained the new election law requires a 7 day reduction in the number of days allowed for early voting but states that the hours should remain the same for each similar election year. This would mean as we prepare for the early voting plan for the May primary in 2014 we must use the same number of hours as in 2010, unless the board voted to request a reduction in those hours. She told board members that the reasons she submitted the request of the reduction in hours are as follows:

She presented two different schedules (see Appendix A and B) the first schedule was the same hours we worked last time, but we must have the same hours to work with. One showing 256 hours and second was the same hours we had in 2010 but with seven less days. She stated that in order to accomplish the requirement of the law by keeping the same number of days we would need to be open 13 ½ hours per(8:30AM to 10:00PM) day plus the first Saturday 8:30AM to 4:00PM and the last Saturday 8:30AM to 1:00PM. She stated she did not figure a Sunday in there because it was coming down the pipe that there would be no Sunday voting so that is why she did not put Sunday in there. Then she explained that they had done another schedule to try and shorten the hours (8:30AM to 5:00PM) including the Saturday voting days amounting to 256 hours. She stated that the cost would be (if we do the 256 hours or just working a half on that Saturday and add 4 ½ more hours to do this) close to $7000.00 for 256 hours. For 426 hours would $9014.50. She said doing this would require poll workers working overtime and that had been problematic in previous elections. The county did not allow over time, not even for regular employees. She talked about other like-size counties that were way below us (see Appendix C). She said that we had always had 4 sites in order to reach all the way across the county.

Cindy Minges asked that of the hours we were open in 2010, how many people voted? Dana said that there was a 13% voter turnout for 2010 which was average for a non-president year election. Courtney Patterson answered that based on the NC BOE, the numbers average 3 voters per hour while the state would like to see 9 voters per hour.

Lucinda Minges, the Board Chair, expressed her support for the request to reduce the hours for the following reasons; she felt we needed to be good stewards of the public’s monies and the means did not justify the money. She also stated that we must consider manpower.

Courtney Patterson, Board Member, stated the reasons that he did not support the request were as follows; he did not need to make a decision of this nature at the last minute. He said that the document he was asked to sign stated that we had had a meeting and that was not the case and finally, he was opposed to the request based on the fact that the North Carolina General Assembly had voted to reduce the number of days while at the same time not changing the number of hours.

Tommy Pharo, Board Member, stated the reasons he supported the request were as follows; He stated we were not following what has happen in other counties comparable to the size of Lenoir, that other counties had used less hours than we used and he saw no reason why we had to be any different. Tommy asked that it be recorded that in no way did he want to deprive any voter their right to vote and that he is looking at the budget and being a good steward of the taxpayer’s money and we are being forced to spend upwards of $18,000 unnecessarily. In comparison to all the other counties in the state. We were #6 of hour in the state now, even with the reduction in hours, we are still number 77. Nobody is keeping anybody from the polls. He stated that we are keeping the same hours for the days it’s just less days.

The meeting ended with a request from Michell Nix for the board to hear comments from the public. The board heard those comments and after which adjourned and the result was that the board was not of a unanimous opinion to request for a reduction in the hours during early votes for the May primary.

Cindy Minges and Tommy Pharo said they both wanted it on record they did support the request for a reduction in hours for early voting during the 2014 May Primary.

Courtney Patterson did not support the request for a reduction in hours early voting during the 2014 May Primary.

The meeting adjourned at 5:30PM.

Submitted by,

Courtney Patterson

APPROVED:

Lucinda B. MingesCourtney M. Patterson Thomas A. Pharo

ChairmanSecretaryMember